Food Shop Owner Gets Taste For Different Locale

NEW HARTFORD — The proprietor of a specialty food shop has closed the place after four years in business, saying New Hartford is too slow and the wrong town for her kind of fare.

Helen Hoke said Tuesday that she is looking for a new place for the business in Avon, Farmington or West Hartford.

``There's no activity in New Hartford,'' Hoke said. ``We may be on a main artery, but they're going somewhere else at 100 mph.''

The Healthy Gourmet catered to people who wanted low-fat food that did not taste like wet cardboard. Fruits and flour were chemical-free, baking was done without egg yolks and red meat was nowhere to be found. The shop, which also offered classes in its full- service kitchen, also served vegetarians, diabetics and others with specialized diets.

Apparently, The Healthy Gourmet could not compete for walk-in customers with the likes of the Full Belly Deli down the road in Pine Meadow.

Elizabeth Lepore, who owns the building at 196 Main St., said Hoke had notified her that The Healthy Gourmet would be vacating its Route 44 location at the end of September. The shop had two years to go on a three-year lease, she said.

But Hoke said she and her staff agreed that staying another two years was not worth it, that the shop would do better by moving east. With her equipment and supplies in storage, Hoke said she has been looking for a new place.

A year ago, Hoke said the shop was doing well, with income growing by 10 percent to 30 percent each year. She said Tuesday that The Healthy Gourmet is not moving for financial reasons.

In New Hartford, the shop was doing 90 percent catering and 10 percent retail. In its new location, Hoke said she wants to reverse those numbers and concentrate on customers in the shop.

``I like the people,'' she said. ``I didn't get into the business to cater.''

The 906 people on The Healthy Gourmet's mailing list want to continue patronizing the shop, Hoke said, and she expects to find a larger customer base in Hartford's less rural suburbs.